HMS E2 was an E class submarine built at Chatham in the years immediately preceding the Great War. The E class were an improved and enlarged version of the previous D class. They went on to be the most numerous submarine in service with the Royal Navy during the First World War with 58 boats being completed, including two for the Royal Australian Navy. Losses were high however, with half the E class boats built being lost during the war. They formed the backbone of the Royal Navy's submarine fleet during the Great War until they were replaced by the L class towards the end of the war.
HMS E2 was originally ordered from Chatham Dockyard as a D Class boat, HMS D10, but the order was changed and she was laid down as E2 on No 7 slip on Valentines Day 1911. She was launched into the River Medway by Mrs Erskine, wife of the Commodore of HMS Pembroke, Captain Seymour Erskine on 23rd November 1912. After fitting out at Chatham, she commissioned on 30th June 1913, under Lieutenant-Commander E Stocks. On completion, she was 178 feet long and 15ft 5" wide across the beam. She displaced 665 tons surfaced and 796 tons dived. She was armed with 4 18" torpedo tubes, 1 in the bow, one firing out of each beam and one in the stern. She needed a crew of 30 men.
A model of an E class submarine. HMS E2 would have been identical.
A cutaway picture of an E class boat, E9. E2 would have been identical.
HMS E2 underway sometime in 1913
In January 1914, she was part of the 8th Submarine Flotilla at Portsmouth with the depot ship HMS Maidstone and on the outbreak of war in August 1914, the flotilla moved to Harwich in order to patrol the North Sea.
In August 1915, HMS E2 was sent to the Dardanelles to relieve HMS E14. On the way there, HMS E2 encountered the anti-submarine net the Turks had laid off Nagara and became entangled in it. Stocks, now promoted to Commander, manoeuvred the boat in an attempt to free her, but this had not gone unnoticed by the Turks. Small boats began dropping bombs on the boat and these were joined by a destroyer firing shells into the water. None of these caused any damage or casualties aboard the boat and she freed herself, badly straining the deck gun mount in doing so. It took two days to repair it. On 14th August she resupplied HMS E11 with ammunition and the two boats began to operate in company.
HMS E2 in the Dardanelles in 1915
On 22nd August, HMS E2 in company with HMS E11 bombarded the railway station and magazine at Mudania and on the same day, she sank a large steamer moored at the pier there.
Later that month, HMS E2 moved to Constantinople, but there was nothing to attack there. On 7th September 1915, the boats First Lieutenant, Mr Lyon swam across to 2 dhows with explosives and blew them both up. The following day, he again swam from the boat, this time with a raft holding a bag of guncotton, the idea being to sabotage a bridge on the Constantinople to Adrianople railway. Although two large explosions were heard, Lt Lyon did not return as planned, despite the boat waiting for 5 hours. HMS E2 stayed in the area for a further two days, but Lt Lyon was not seen or heard from again.
On 2nd January 1916, HMS E2 became the last British submarine to be recalled from the area and joined the Mediterranean Flotilla at Malta.
During April 1917 under a new commander, Lieutenant-Commander Graveney, HMS E2 unsuccessfully attacked a German U-Boat.
At the end of the war, HMS E2 was obsolete and was sold to Mr B Zammit for scrap in Malta on 7th March 1921.
